By Kent Paisley
The 2021 LPGA Tour season moves on to its 10th tournament of the year this week at the Pure Silk Championship. At a glance, it would seem like a run-of-the-mill event, albeit one that begins a parade of 11 straight weeks of tournaments through early August.

But with a closer look, the stop at Kingsmill Resort in Williamsburg, Va., is actually one of the more critical weeks of the year for LPGA members, specifically those who earned their cards via Q-Series and have limited status. After Sunday’s play wraps up, the LPGA “reshuffles” the priority list for tour members for the first time since the middle of 2019. That means players have one last tournament to earn critical CME points and potentially set themselves up for more access to events for the rest of 2021.

“Reshuffles are huge, especially for people who don’t have the best priority status,” said LPGA Tour rookie Jennifer Chang. “If I can bump up a couple more spots even, depending on how everything goes, that would be a huge thing for me. Even just one spot can be the difference between getting into a tournament versus not getting into one.”

Like the PGA Tour, the LPGA classifies members into various categories depending on their play from the previous season. Top categories include players high on the money list, career money leaders and winners in recent seasons. Tournament fields are filled in order of categories, so the better or higher category you’re in, the better chance you can pick what events you want to play in.

The reshuffle, which ordinarily happens twice during the season, lets players from lower categories move into higher ones based on their current play (or move up on the priority ranking within a category).

Reshuffles for 2021 are using CME points instead of official money. And the potential movement is limited. The LPGA Tour has Category 8 for players from lower categories who are in the top 80 of the CME points list in 2021 after Pure Silk. In addition, Category 13 will absorb all players from lower categories who don’t move to Category 8.

So, for example, Leona Maguire is 16th on the CME points list and will move up from Category 9 (the top 10 LPGA Symetra Tour players) to Category 8. Lydia Ko sits atop the CME points list but is already in Category 1, so she won’t reshuffle.

Chang is currently in Category 14 from earning her card through Q-Series in 2019. This category is the break even group for entry into most full-field events. Chang finished T-9 at the 2019 Q-Series, and is currently 137th on the tour’s overall priority list. Chang is making her seventh start of the season at the Pure Silk, a full-field event with 142 players competing. (A priority number inside 144 essentially lets you play any full-field event you wish.)

On the other side of the breakeven point is long-hitting Bianca Pagdanganan. She, too, is in Category 14 (finished T-38 at Q-Series) but is 167th on the overall priority list. The 23-year-old Filipino rookie has only played twice this year, and just once from her status. (Pagdanganan’s start at the ANA Inspiration came from finishing in the top 80 on the money list in 2020.) She’s missed the cut in both starts so has no CME points earned in 2021. Thus she needs to have a really good week (top eight or better finish) in hopes of somehow getting into Category 8 or risk moving only to Category 13 and being low on the priority list inside the category. (All this despite a third-place finish at the LPGA Drive On last fall and a spot in the CME Group Tour Championship last December.)

Bianca Pagdanganan needs a T-8 finish or better this week at Kingsmill if she hopes to jump from Category 14 to Category 8 and be able to pick what full-field events she plays in this summer on the LPGA Tour. Michael Reaves

“I think the reshuffles are a bit stressful for some players, especially for rookies, because if you get passed, your schedule can be very much in limbo,” says LPGA Tour veteran Christina Kim, currently in Category 14 as a Q-Series grad but set to move to Category 8 thanks to being 57th on the 2021 CME points list. “On the flip side, if you’re in my camp, knowing that all I needed was a tee time to get a chance to play well, you don’t have to focus on the reshuffle because good golf will take care of itself.”

Chang has made the most of her opportunities, with her first career top-10 at the LPGA Drive On Championship at Golden Ocala in February. She is in 72nd place on the CME points list and is in the field in Kingsmill. If she stays in the top 80 after play on Sunday, she’ll move to Category 8. Otherwise she can only jump to Category 13.

The second reshuffle doesn’t happen until after the CP Women’s Open the last week of August. So for many Q-Series grads, this week is a make or break point for hopes of keeping a LPGA card for 2022 or having to go back to the Q-Series.

The post Why this week’s event at Kingsmill is a make-or-break moment in the 2021 season for several LPGA pros appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Ryan Herrington

Less than 24 hours after shedding tears of frustration and sadness at Missouri’s Boone Valley G.C., Erica Shepherd was crying again, only this time out of joy. The 16-year-old from Greenwood, Ind., had accomplished a lifelong golf dream by capturing the U.S. Girls’ Junior title, defeating Jennifer Chang in the 36-hole championship match, 3 and 2.

Growing up, Shepherd’s friend and golf mentor has been Leigh Anne Hardin, a former junior golf prodigy from Indiana who won the Girls’ Junior title in 1998. Shepherd’s middle name is Leigh, and the screen shot on Shepherd’s cellphone is a photo of Hardin with the Girls’ Junior trophy that has served as motivation.

“Ever since I was little, I’ve always told everyone when making my goals, this is the goal that I have to accomplish,” Shepherd said, her emotions obvious.

The ultimate victory came a day after one of the toughest wins of her young career. On the 19th hole of her semifinal match on Friday, Shepherd’s opponent, Elizabeth Moon, missed a three-foot birdie putt that would have given her the win. Before Shepherd, a high school senior-to-be could concede the tap-in par putt, Moon hastily pulled her ball back.

Afterward, Shepherd was upset with the reaction to what had happen on social media, much of it negative toward how she handled the situation. Shepherd said she would have conceded the putt and the pair could have played on, but the *Rules of Golf * prohibited her from doing so retroactively.

Trying to block out the emotions from Friday was going to be a challenge for Shepherd, but she was helped by the fact that her final opponent, Chang, is a good friend who came up to her before the start of their Saturday match with a message.

“I was on the putting green, and she just walked toward me and gave me a hug,” Shepherd said. “She just asked if I was OK, and I kind of broke down and started crying, then she gave me this whole speech about like how there was nothing I could have done about it, and that just really boosted me back up and got me to regroup.”

“I said, Forget about that,” Chang said. “Let’s have some fun. Just you and me, one-on-one. Let’s go for it.”

Erica Shepherd and Jennifer Chang talk as they walk off the third hole during the championship match at the 2017 U.S. Girls’ Junior. (Photo by Copyright USGA/Steven Gibbons)

Shepherd proceeded to jump to an early 2-up lead through five holes, an interesting spot for Chang, 17, a rising high school senior from Cary, N.C., as she had not trailed in any of her previous five matches. Chang bounced back, winning four of the next seven holes to gain a 1-up advantage. But Shepherd then won five of the final six holes in the morning to take a 3-up advantage into the afternoon 18.

Shepherd stretched her lead to 4-up with 12 to play, only to watch Chang cut her opponent’s edge to 1-up with five left. It was then that Shepherd seized the moment, winning the 32nd hole with a birdie (after Chang had missed a birdie effort of her own), then made birdie on the 34th hole to close out the match and the championship.

Afterward, Shepherd described a call she received the previous night from Hardin that helped calm her nerves and boost her confidence.

“She just told me she knew how I felt because she can relate to me caring too much about what other people think,” said Shepherd, who has verbally committed to play college golf at Duke, naturally where Hardin competed. “She told me to just be Erica, and to not let what other people were saying get in my head or distract me.”

Shepherd’s victory was a milestone of sorts as she became the first lefty to win the Girls’ Junior title in its 69-year history. She became the second left-handed female champion in USGA history, joining another Indiana native, Julia Potter, the 2013 and 2016 U.S. Women’s Mid-Amateur champ). Coincidentally, the last time Boone Valley hosted a USGA event was the 2007 U.S. Junior Amateur, won by another lefty, Cory Whitsett.

“I’m really proud of Erica,” Chang said. “She’s one of my best friends, and it’s a fun match with her. I mean, there’s that intensity, but it’s fun.”

“I was definitely down before that,” Shepherd said, “but as soon as I got on the tee, I was looking at the trophy, and I’m like, I have a chance to win the U.S. Girls’ Junior today, so I’m not going to let any of that get in the way.”

The post No controversy this time as Erica Shepherd wins final match at the U.S. Girls’ Junior, claims dream title appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.